Secret Santa Surprise
by butterflywhisper
Summary: Sara's Secret Santa has a really big surprise for her. Whatever will it be?


A/N: Spoilers up through 8x02 A La Cart. Not so much after that. Also, I have no claim to CSI (bummer). I also have no claim to xBox, James Bond or any other products mentioned in the story.

* * *

The entire night shift team, minus Grissom and Brass, was gathered in the break room a week before Christmas for the Secret Santa gift exchange. Sara was there as well even though she was no longer part of the team. She had moved to the swing shift after her relationship with Grissom was exposed but everyone still included her whenever the team got together. 

Normally, they would've waited until a couple days before Christmas to do the gift exchange, but Nick was headed back home to Texas for a long holiday vacation and they wanted to do the exchange while he was still around.

Greg was sitting at the end of the table so that he could watch the door. He was anxious for everyone to arrive so they could get started. Nick sat beside him on one side of the table and Warrick sat beside Nick while they talked about how the different NFL teams were faring. On the other side of the table, Catherine sat closest to Greg and Sara sat beside her. They casually chatted about different things from work to Lindsey to their plans for the holidays. This was Sara and Grissom's second Christmas as a couple so they planned on going to Lake Tahoe for a few days so they could spend some time together without any of the distractions of work.

Everyone was excited for the holidays and the immediate anticipation of the gift exchange only added to the buzz. But there was one person in particular who was feeling a bit more anticipation than everyone else. And a lot of nervousness. Grissom had drawn Sara's name in the Secret Santa exchange and he had something special planned . . .

_It was the Monday after Thanksgiving and Catherine, Nick, Warrick and Greg were gathered in the break room awaiting assignments. Greg, as per his usual self, was practically bouncing off the walls but he did seem a bit more restless than usual._

_"Stop it, Greg," Catherine yelled as he bounced a ball on the table and nearly knocked over her cup of coffee. "Who put the quarter in you today?"_

_"Aren't you excited?" he whined. "It's Christmas!"_

_"You're worse than a little kid," Catherine said as she turned back to browsing through her magazine._

_"It's not Christmas for another four weeks so just chill," Warrick interjected._

_"Greggo?__ Chill? You've got to be kidding," Nick said putting in his two cents._

_"Come on, today's the day!"_

_Everyone just looked at Greg._

_"You can't have forgotten! It's tradition!" As everyone continued to just stare at him, Greg let out an exasperated sigh. __"The Secret Santa Exchange?__ We always draw the names the Monday after Thanksgiving?" Greg could practically see the light bulbs coming on in his teammates' heads. "Geez, it's like __one of __the best part__s__ of Christmas."_

_Just then Grissom came in with a handful of papers. "What's the best part of Christmas?" he asked._

_Greg rolled his eyes then leaned back in his chair crossing his arms over his chest. "I give up!"_

_"Greg," Grissom said with a hint of warning in his voice._

_"The gift exchange.__ Has like everyone lost their mind? We always draw names the Monday after Thanksgiving!"_

_"Oh," Grissom replied. He had in all honestly forgotten. It was__n't exactly __on his list of priorities. __Usually someone on the team would bring it up and kind of take charge of it. __"Well, ah, does everyone want to do it again this year?"_

_Everyone nodded in agreement while Greg was practically jumping out of his chair. _

_"Alright then, Greg, you take care of the __name-__drawing. OK, then, assignments . . _

_"Wait, wait," Greg interrupted._

_"Yes?"__ he questioned with a hint of impatience._

_"Well, uh . . . well, do __we__ . . . umm . . ."_

_Grissom was quickly losing patience. "Spit it out, Greg."_

_"Well, what about Sara?" he asked hesitantly._

_"What about her?"_

_"Are we going to include her this year since she's not part of __the__ team anymore? We always just include Brass even though he's not part of the team so I think we should do the same for Sara_

_"I'd like to include her," Nick said. Warrick and Catherine nodded in agreement._

_Sure, I'm sure she'd like to be included. __She was about to leave for the day. Greg, maybe you can still catch her. She should be in the locker room." _

_Greg grinned and sprinted out of the room looking for his favorite co-worker while Grissom started handing out assignments._

_A few minutes later, Greg came back with Sara._

_"Hey, everyone," Sara greeted __the team__. "Thanks for including me. I really miss this. The swing shift sucks. Everyone just goes their own way," she said as she dropped into a chair._

_While Greg quickly wrote down all the names on slips of paper and dropped the slips into a bowl__, the team __agreed __upon __a $25 price limit. They then each took turns drawing names. One last slip was left in the bowl and Catherine grabbed it saying she would give it to Brass when she met him out at her crime scene._

_But Grissom didn't hear that. He was lost in thought when he realized that he had drawn Sara's name. He knew he was going to have to do something special or else he would never hear the end of it from his team. Besides, he liked doing special things for Sara. Then the inkling of an idea took hold. It was something he had been thinking of doing for several weeks now, especially since Sara's kidnapping, but he never planned anything__ specific__. This was giving him a very __unique opportunit__y__ to put his plan into action__As the idea began to formulate in his mind, h__e began to grin like a Cheshire cat. He glanced up and saw that Sara was looking at him questioningly. He quickly wiped the grin off his face and got serious. _

_"Alright, everyone back to work."_

Now, about three weeks later, Grissom's inkling of an idea was about to come to fruition and he was nervous. He actually kind of surprised himself. What he was about to do was something very out of character with his private nature and for what it was worth, for Sara's private nature as well. But he wanted to make this a moment that Sara would never forget. To help his plan along, he pulled Jim into his office and requested a favor. He knew Jim always played Santa during the gift exchange and handed out the gifts so he asked his friend to make sure that Sara's gift was the last one handed out. Jim knew then who Sara's Secret Santa was but he certainly never thought the geeky entomologist would pull off what he did.

It was now a few minute past the end of the shift and once Grissom and Brass showed up, the party could get started. Greg was starting to bounce off the walls while Nick had moved on to telling everyone about his plans for his long holiday in Texas. Meanwhile, Catherine kept glancing at her watch anxious to get out of there so she could finish up her Christmas shopping.

Finally, Grissom came in and took a seat a little bit off in a corner near Warrick.

Shortly afterwards, Brass came in wearing a Santa hat and a long white beard. But at that, the similarities to Santa ended. "Ho, ho, ho. Have you all been good little boys and girls this year?" Then looking at Grissom and then Sara, he said "Well, I know you two haven't been."

Grissom and Sara both turned bright shades of red – almost as red as Brass's Santa hat – while everyone else smirked. That was until Catherine couldn't hold it in any longer and she outright laughed which caused everyone else to burst out laughing.

As the laughter started dying down, Grissom, slightly irritated, told Jim, "Alright, get started handing out the gifts."

"Let's see here," Brass said as he reached into his bag and pulled out a gift that was shaped like a DVD case. Reading the name off the tag, he said, "First present is for a little boy named Nicky."

Nick grinned reaching for the package. He unwrapped the present to reveal one of the latest xBox video games. "Hey, new video game. Good thing. I was tired of playing all the old games that we have here."

"You were only tired of it 'cause your ass kept getting whooped," Warrick taunted him.

"Whatever, man. I clearly remember giving you an ass-whooping yesterday."

"Only because Greggo distracted me!"

"Boys!" Catherine interjected. "You're worse than a bunch of 3-year-olds."

"So come on, Nick, you've got to guess who gave it to you," Sara said.

Nick looked around trying to read everyone's expression but no one was giving anything away. Not getting any help that way, he started reasoning through who it could be. "Well, I don't think it was Catherine or Sara. They both hate video games. Wouldn't be Grissom. I think a video game is the last thing he would think of. I say it was Greg." When Greg shook his head negatively, Nick moved on. "Warrick?"

"Nah, man. I'm still whooping your ass with the old games."

"Brass?"

Brass nodded. "Maybe finally I'll here about something other than that old football game you're always playing!"

As Nick and Warrick studied the new game, Santa Brass dipped back into his sack pulling out a medium-sized rectangular box that weighed a fair bit for its size. "Ah, this one's for the naughty boy over in the corner." When he handed the package to Grissom, Grissom just glared at him.

Grissom methodically unwrapped the box to reveal a box of candy. But it wasn't just any candy, it was a big box of chocolate-covered insects including grasshoppers, crickets and ants. "Hey, these look good!" he exclaimed as he proceeded to open the box, pick one out and promptly eat it. He offered the candy around but all he got was a chorus of eewwws, yucks, grosses and a bunch of disgusted looks.

"So?" Brass prompted.

"Oh, umm," looking around, Grissom couldn't help but notice how Greg was practically jumping out of his chair. "Greg."

Greg was crestfallen that Grissom had guessed so easily. "Geez, that was too easy."

Grissom responded with, "Piece of advice, Greg. Don't gamble. You don't have a poker face." Then he started munching on another piece of candy. Seeing Sara's grossed out look, he winked at her and she teasingly stuck her tongue out at him in response.

"Alright, you two. Cut it out. You can make cutesy faces at each other once you get home," Jim said.

"Brass!" Sara exclaimed.

At the same time, Grissom yelled, "Damn it, Jim, lay off with the stupid remarks." They were both getting irritated with Brass's teasing.

Jim dug around in his sack again for the next present. Pulling out a fancy envelope, he passed it to Warrick. "And for the good little boy named Warrick."

"What's this? A gift certificate. Come on, people. Use a little imagination." He pulled the flap open and pulled out two tickets to the hottest concert coming to town in January. Warrick couldn't believe his good luck. The tickets had been sold out for months and he hadn't been able to lay his hands on a pair anywhere. "Oh, man," he exclaimed excitedly. "These have been sold out for months! But, these are way more than $25." He knew there was only one person who would've thought of this or who could've afforded it. Looking right at Catherine, he said with gratitude, "Thanks, Cath. This is absolutely amazing. Thank you so much."

"Hey, no problem," she responded quietly.

"But this is way beyond the limit. You shouldn't have."

"Actually, they were complementary." She shrugged her shoulders dismissively. "Just one of the perks of being Sam Braun's daughter." She didn't want to linger on this any longer so she turned the attention back to Brass. "So, Jim, who's next?"

"Why, Catherine," he said as he reached in and pulled out a small and dainty box, "that would be you."

"Thank you," she replied as she took the box from Jim. She unwrapped the bow and took off the foil wrapping paper to expose a small jewelry box. She opened it to reveal a beautiful set of sterling silver hoop earrings. "Wow, they're pretty. I like!" She looked around. "Of course it can't be Jim or Greg. It wouldn't be Gris. Course, our girl Sara has whipped him into shape so maybe it is?" When he shook his head, she moved on. "Warrick?" but he replied that it wasn't him. "Nick?"

"Yup. I'm glad you like them."

"Oh, I do. You're going to make some girl a fine husband some day, Nicky."

"Aw, shucks," he replied blushing slightly.

"Next," Santa Brass continued while pulling out a tall, lean box, "we have something for a young, handsome gentleman by the name of Jim." He looked around like he seriously was searching for someone, then "Oh, well, what do you know? Guess that's me." Everyone just chuckled. Brass ripped the ribbons and wrapping off, opened the box and pulled out a bottle of bourbon. "Oh hey, this is the good stuff."

Greg whispered loudly, "I think he's been in the stuff already." Everyone laughed.

"I haven't even started, Greg, my boy." He promptly pulled the cork out, glanced around to make sure no one of great importance was around and then took a good slug of the stuff. "Aw, this is the really, really good stuff."

"Well, who'd you get it from?" prompted Nick.

Jim looked at Grissom and said, "I would've said Gil but I know it's not from him."

"Hey, how do you know that?" Catherine questioned. "There wasn't supposed to be any revealing of Secret Santas ahead of time."

"Just an educated guess," Brass replied. "So that leaves Warrick or Sara. Hmm. Warrick would be the logical choice but something tells me it was Sara."

Sara dipped her head confirming that it was her.

"Thanks, Cookie."

"There's one condition to that present, though."

"Condition?" Brass asked hesitantly as everyone looked to Sara. He didn't want to think what that condition may be.

"If I catch you," she said as she pointed at him and then pointed to Grissom, "or him passed out drunk in my living room again, you are both sleeping with the dog!"

Grissom and Brass grinned sheepishly while everyone laughed at the image of Grissom and Brass passed out drunk.

"It's not funny," Sara said indignantly.

"When did that happen?" Catherine asked between laughs as she wiped at her tears.

"Oh, it's not just been once. It's happened at least three times!"

"What?!" Catherine was clearly flabbergasted. Brass she could envision drunk and passed out. But in all her years she had known Grissom, she had only seen him drunk once and that was shortly after he had got back from San Francisco the time he had met Sara, although she didn't know at the time that that was the event that had precipitated his drinking. Although, she did remember him mumbling all night about letting chances slip by.

"Yeah, don't let those two drink together 'cause they'll just keep trying to outdo each other until one or both of them pass out. They're worse than a couple teenagers."

"Ok, ok, moving on," Grissom said, embarrassed that everyone now knew one of his secrets.

"Yeah, yeah, moving on," Greg said trying to hurry up Brass. There were only two gifts left so he knew he had a 50-50 chance of being next when Brass would grab the next gift from his bag.

"Well, hmm, let's see here," Brass said as he deliberately went slow just to antagonize Greg. "This one is for a . . . . well, what do you know. There's no name. But there is a description here. For the antsy, irritating, annoying ex-lab rat." He looked around the group. "We know anyone by that description?"

Greg threw his hand up in the air waving his arm back and forth like a little second-grader desperately trying to get the teacher's attention.

"No?" Brass continued. Then he started putting the gift back in his sack. "Moving on to the last present."

"Brass, give me my flipping present!" Greg exclaimed.

"Oh, that's you? Guess irritating and annoying should've given it away." Brass handed the gift over to Greg.

"Ha, ha, very funny." Greg inspected the name tag on the gift. "Hey, it doesn't say any of that on here. It just says 'Greg'." Then he tore into his gift. It was a couple James Bond DVDs. "Cool, man! And they're even ones I don't have yet. This has got to be from Warrick."

"Right on, man," Warrick said as the two of them clasped hands in a show of brotherhood. "I heard you telling our man Nick here that you were missing some DVDs from your Bond collection and I thought I heard you say that these two were some of them."

"Well, guess that's it, boys and girls," Brass said as he started closing up his Santa sack.

Sara just glared at him. She was anxious and curious especially now that she knew Gil was her Secret Santa. When he went to walk out the room, she called out after him, "Jim, I think you still have one in there."

Jim shook his bag. "By golly, I think you're right." He opened his sack and reached in. First pulling it out and taking his time studying the name tag, he then turned towards Sara. "Well, what do you know? It says it's for Sara." He handed over a square box about the size of a soccer ball.

"So, Gil, who did you threaten with decomp duty to get Sara's name?" Catherine asked.

"Didn't have to. Just worked out that way," he replied.

"Yeah, right," jeered Catherine. "You expect us to believe that?"

Grissom just shrugged his shoulders and said, "Believe what you want." He then turned his full attention on Sara while the rest of the team scoffed. He wanted to catch Sara's reaction and he wasn't about to let himself be distracted.

Sara carefully unraveled the burgundy-colored ribbon bow and lifted the lid off the gold-foil box. At first, all she saw was white tissue paper. Pushing it aside, she then saw a small, black velvet-covered, squarish box. Just looking at the inner box, Sara knew that this was worth way more than $25 and that it was going to be something pretty special. She looked up at Grissom with a small smile and a question in her eyes. He just stared back giving nothing away.

"What is it? What is it?" Greg asked anxiously as he tried to peer inside the box from where he sat.

Catherine had seen a glimpse of what she thought was a jewelry box and was surprised that her friend Gil actually had the forethought to do something a little extra special for the gift exchange. Nick and Warrick were just waiting patiently.

Slowly, Sara reached into the box and pulled out the velvet box. She was excited to open it and yet a little apprehensive. She just had a feeling this was something extremely special. She slowly pried the box open and gasped. She covered her mouth with one hand while muttering, "Oh my God, oh my God," over and over again.

At Sara's reaction, Catherine leaned over to peer at the box in Sara's hand and immediately dropped her jaw. She couldn't have spoken if she wanted to she was so surprised.

Sara looked up at Gil and just stared at him with a look that spoke of utter shock, awe and love along with the question of if this really meant what she thought it did.

Gil merely quirked an eyebrow in question as a small grin flirted with the corners of his lips.

Sara turned her attention back to her gift. "I . . . uh . . . oh my God. I don't believe this."

Gil queried, "Well?"

"Yes," Sara whispered as she nodded while still staring at her gift. She then looked up at Gil as a huge smile broke out. "Yes, yes."

She got up then, ran over and threw herself into Gil's lap, wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him thoroughly. When she pulled back a little, Gil was grinning. She then started planting kisses all over his face and neck as she kept whispering "yes" between each kiss.

Everyone else in the room, except for Catherine as she had seen the ring, sat in astounded silence as the two most private people they knew were making out right in front of them. They were even more astounded when Grissom stood up with Sara in his arms and started carrying her out of the break room, presumably headed to his office.

After a couple minutes, Nick finally broke the silence when he asked, "What the heck just happened here?"

"I think that," Catherine replied, "was a marriage proposal, Grissom-style."

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THE END 

A/N: This story isn't up to my usual standards but I had to get this out of the way so I could get back to my real Christmas story which I'm hoping to start posting this weekend. Hope you enjoyed this story anyways!


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